


a stellar collision

by geode



Series: for others! [4]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Gen, can you tell the author is v defensive of marius pontmercy, emotional enj, i had way too much fun worldbuilding im def gonna be writing more in this 'verse hoo boy, projection as usual, science fiction realism??, this started as a feuilly-enj thing but turned into just a sort of enjo vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-15
Updated: 2017-12-15
Packaged: 2019-02-15 05:32:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13024284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/geode/pseuds/geode
Summary: Enjolras just wants a nap, but he made plans three weeks ago that demand otherwise.





	a stellar collision

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Bobcatmoran](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bobcatmoran/gifts).



> hopefully this all makes sense! (5 pts if u work out what a decollate is)

In their second year, students have to move offplanet, which divides them in opinion pretty much down the middle; some, like Feu, like being closer to Novari and the fact that the Suburbias have gardens and there isn't a fire alarm drill every Wednesday morning at 6.15 on the whole of the Eastern Hemisphere. Enjolras thinks Feuilly's opinion here is invalid, however, because he had bought a telepassport at the beginning of the year and thus doesn't have to deal with the tremendous pain in the ass that is the saucers.

 

 

He texts Marius while he's waiting at the S-stop, fingers stiff from the cold.

 

_moving out of a small town should've meant I was finally free from the talons of public transport timetables but alas_

 

**U only get my sympathy if youve been waiting longer than 20mins**

 

_...16_

 

**Fuck u no dice**

 

_it's cold though. cold makes time go slower that's physics_

 

**Ur so smart I'm in awe**

 

**Are u wearing ur gloves??**

 

_I would have long since perished had I not been wearing the gloves, thank you times ten to the power of ten_

 

**a) Why do u speak like this b) Ur welcome**

 

_I am but a 21st century aristocrat_

 

**I hope ur saucer hits u**

 

_YOU SUMMONED IT HOLY SHIT_

 

_curse me like this anytime I appreciate it_

 

_ttyl_

 

**Have a good day shithead**

 

 

Truly, the gloves had been a life-saver ever since the frost had set in the week before; the only downside is that they were an atrocious neon yellow colour, which while Enjolras himself didn't care about in any fashion sense, everyone made a point of commenting on them whenever he brought them out. He reckons that was exactly Marius' thought process when he bought them for him. 

 

"Nice gloves," the pilot grins as he hands over his fare, as if to cosmically illustrate his point. Enjolras smiles tightly back, thanks him and heads to the upper deck, earbuds already in, mind already determinedly thinking positive thoughts about the day ahead - switch flicked to survival mode. Who cares if it's cold enough to freeze an icemoon? Who cares if the next three hours will be spent listening to an academically and acoustically terrible decollate? Who cares if he has to eat lunch alone because Feuilly has back to back classes until five? Actually, that all sounded awful. Fuck positivity. It's been a long week, Enjolras deserves a mope.

 

His phone pings in his pocket again and snaps him back from his angry internal tangent. _Oh yeah, Marius_. That's something to look forward to, at least, although he'd never admit it seeing as Marius would inevitably use it against him.)

 

 

 

The day's low points are as follows:

 

He and Joly have to do a presentation, and it very nearly kills them. Long story short, Joly realises halfway through a sentence that they'd read the wrong chapter of the textbook and in a misfired effort to maintain his dignity, continues the sentence - and the presentation - to their bitter ends, and manages to shoehorn in a bit of the St Crispin's Day speech to fill their ten minute slot. It would've been rather moving if Enjolras hadn't been dissociating and missed it because he was wiping the entire thing from his memory while it was still happening.

 

Simulation is cancelled because someone tried to hack their way through a blackhole during an exam and crashed all the servers, so they have to go through a couple of chapters of theory for the nth time instead; Enjolras actually feels his brain decaying.

 

Worst of all, he has an incredibly awkward meeting with his PT where Enjolras has to come up with a non-insulting way to say the classes he's missed weren't worth his time. It's not like he was sleeping or partying or whatever normal people do when they skive - if anyone looked at the security camera footage of the 1793rd floor of the library they'd see him eyeballs deep in books that could teach him way more than any ancient professor could in a whole semester. 

 

 

When he steps outside at 5.04, free at last, it's dark but not raining, and Enjolras chooses to take this as a sign of things improving slightly. It's confirmed as a sign when Feuilly appears beside him, grinning and bundled up in his huge ugly coat.

 

"Hey!" he says, and Enjolras practically falls into his hug. "You alright?"

 

"Just glad to see you. Glad the week's over."

 

"Hear hear. You ready to go?"

 

Enjolras coaxes small talk about his day out of him on the way to the S-stop, riding the wave of energy he'd got from their reunion. In all seriousness, he's kind of hopeless without Feuilly: they've been inseparable for a year now, and it's still weird being apart for more than a few hours at a time, so Fridays are hard.

 

"You got any ideas for where to eat?" Enj asks idly as they wait for boarding. It's a tiny joy to be riding the saucer with someone for once, and he owes Feuilly his life for not abandoning him in favour of the teleport, which he can't be sure he wouldn't have done if the situation was reversed.

 

"Depends what the flight's done to Marius. Last time I flew intergalactic I ended up craving these weird Pink Sea crabcakes they only have on Elenatros."

 

"When did you go to Elenatros?"

 

"That's the thing, I haven't! I've only ever seen them in movies. Apparently they're not even nice."

 

"Well, hopefully he won't be that much of a nuisance. He's usually up for whatever, but a lot of it."

 

"Excellent. What time's he getting in? I'm starving."

 

"Half an hour-ish."

 

 

Enjolras isn't nervous, exactly. It's just... strange, his two worlds colliding like this. Probably all the stranger for the fact they somehow haven't met each other before today, despite them being the two people Enjolras spoke to most every day. In their defense, Marius had been on placement two solar systems away, and Feuilly didn't splash out on cross-galaxy messaging.

 

It's a bit like bringing your boyfriend to meet your parents, and Enjolras doesn't want to analyse the implications of that analogy.

 

_God_. He hopes Marius won't make an ass of himself, but isn't gonna bet on it. He doubly hopes he didn't decide to bring any photos from Enjolras' emo years for taunting purposes. Neither of them are particularly advanced in social skills, and Marius had developed the habit of using Enjolras' embarrassment as a bonding technique with third parties in this exact way.

 

 

It turns out he both needn't have worried and was spot on in his fears; Marius waves from the midst of the crowd at the airport, yelling his name too because Enjolras doesn't see him at first due to the misshapen aquamarine wig he's wearing, not to mention the heavy-handed eyeliner. Unfortunately, this is not inexplicable.

 

" _Fear me, mortal, for I am the ghost of Christmas past!_ " he bellows over the heads of about six perplexed people. Enjolras wants to dig a hole and jump in and take Marius down with him, but he just stops and glares at him. Marius grins wider and continues, gliding towards them in the way he apparently thinks ghosts would move. " _I have travelled ten winters to tell you, my future self, that this colour really drains your undertone!_ "

 

Feuilly is understandably lost until Marius reaches them and holds out his hand archaically for him to shake. "Hi! I'm Enj at fifteen, otherwise known-" and thankfully he pulls off the wig to reveal his own stupid hair, "as Marius. Nice to finally meet you." He turns to Enjolras.

 

"I hate you," Enjolras greets him.

 

"Thought I'd get it out the way right off the bat," he shrugs. He turns back to Feuilly. "Did he tell you he once went to a Dead Red Rose concert, alone, and cried?"

 

" _No?_ " Feuilly squawks.

 

"Then we have much to discuss," Marius throws an arm around each of them and wheels the three of them towards the exit and the nearest source of food.

 

Enjolras hates him. He takes back what he briefly thought earlier about looking forward to seeing him.

 

 

They get on frighteningly well, Feuilly and Marius. In the back of his mind Enjolras knew they would: he supposes that in a way they've already known each other for months, because he's been talking about them to each this whole time. If Feuilly had any social media accounts at all this wouldn't be so nerve-wracking.

 

"Somehow I didn't anticipate how similar you look," Feu says, eyes flicking between the two of them.

 

"I did _say_ ," Enjolras reminds him.

 

Marius nods in sympathy. "I agree it's hard to wrap your head around, that one person can look this good, let alone two." It's been under an hour and he's already learnt how Feuilly's sense of humour works. Enjolras doesn't know what to make of that yet.

 

"Enjolras really doesn't strike the casual observer as a twin," Feu agrees.

 

"It was an embryo of much talent."

 

"Will you shut _up_ ," Enjolras kicks him under the table and stuffs a potato in his mouth, although feeling the need to add through his mouthful, " _God_ , I'd forgotten how annoying you were."

 

Marius smiles sweetly and kicks him back.

 

Feuilly laughs. "I see where you get your vernacular, Enj. Surely not everyone on French Eso speaks like you guys."

 

" _Au contraire_ ," Marius replies, and Feuilly laughs again.

 

 

Back in Sub 8, they're sprawling on the sofa, Enj in the middle, and he has a bit of a moment.

 

This could, and probably might, be what he's got going forward, and he's cool with that. His brother and his best friend, the devil and the angel on his shoulder respectively; in five, ten, fifteen years they'll be sitting on a different sofa watching a different documentary but they'll still be sitting, together. Marius will inevitably degenerate into a full blown dad, the jokes and the cut-off shorts and the gardening and probably the kid too. Feuilly will end up doing something no one would imagine of him, retire early and buy a villa by the Pink Sea and have crabcakes served to him on great shining platters. Enjolras will... well, fuck knows. Aid pilot, war reporter, figurehead of the public transport revolution. Whatever it is will be infinitely different to Suburbia and 9am lectures but this right here will be the same, he reckons. He'll be able to count on them in any kind of future.

 

He glances over at Feuilly, engrossed in the oceanography show they're watching, and feels a pang in his heart, contentment, gratitude, something. 

 

"Anyone want a drink?" he prods them each in the leg and hauls himself up. Marius mumbles and sleepily bats him away, nestling deeper into the cushions.

 

"Food coma," Feuilly diagnoses. "Can I have some tea?"

 

 

He ends up tiptoe-ing after Enj into the kitchen to help and they faff around with the kettle in their usual domestic dance; Enj's moment stretches on. He wants to ask Feuilly what his opinion of Marius is, but that's just embarrassing.

 

He suddenly thinks maybe his previous analogy was wrong - it's not like his boyfriend meeting his parents, it's like his fiancé meeting his extended family, with the overarching dread of realising that he's stuck with this now. The two for one deal him and Marius have always come as is something Enjolras had been trying to distance himself from this past year, what with him fucking off to Mount Hespion to teach kids how to read and leaving Enj to come to Novari alone, and live alone, for the first time in his life. He doesn't resent him for it; you can't resent someone for their kindness backfiring. But it was weird and hard, and coming back home in the summer had been something of a fall back into routine. He'd realised he couldn't leave him behind, and in that case it's long overdue for him to meet everyone Enj had met in his absence.

 

He'd planned the weekend meticulously: tomorrow is lunch at his favourite buffet place with Bahorel, Grantaire and Chetta, then off to the natural history museum to meet Joly and Bossuet and shamelessly use Joly's staff discount. In the evening is the fancy old cinema Marius had been pestering him to take him to, and hopefully Combeferre will be free by then. Sunday's the designated lazy day, and Enj had bribed everyone who didn't already live with him to come over in pyjamas and watch awful YA movies. He's pretty proud of this plan. It was gonna be a nice Last Good Day before Hell Week began..

 

He meets Feuilly's eyes across the kitchen counter and makes a face, sipping from his mug.

 

"Wish my family made me this happy," Feuilly says in amusement. 

 

"Don't we?" Enjolras fires back in faux-offence.

 

 

Marius is completely passed out when they return, so Enj throws a blanket over his fetal form and turns down the light. Despite the looming deadlines and the prospect of spending a month holed up in Eso afterwards for the winter holidays, with only mountains of textbooks for company, he goes to sleep probably the happiest he's ever been. Well, not even happiness, that's the thing, just... okay.

 

_Tout va bien se passer_ , his mother's voice whispers to him softly in the darkness. Everything will be alright.

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
